


Say No to Drugs

by AllTheFeels



Category: Gorillaz
Genre: Character Study, Childhood Trauma, Drug Addiction, Family Dynamics, Gen, Mental Health Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-14
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-12-02 00:01:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11497566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AllTheFeels/pseuds/AllTheFeels
Summary: He knows he's a shit person.





	Say No to Drugs

He knows he's a shit person.

Well, it's not like it's hard to come to that realization--- he's not special for being self aware. Murdoc is the kind of person that isn't built for families, for kindness; He had no soft edges, no gentleness beneath his tough shell. He'd rather buy a bottle of cough syrup than apply for a job at the store, if that makes sense. Sure, the bottle would make him trip for eight hours, feel like shit, and essentially rely on Russel's good will to stay even somewhat functional, but even that was better than settling.

Settling down, settling for a person- any kind of settling was just plain bad. He'd never settled in his life, he wasn't the kind of person to have to luxury to settle. Murdoc would rather survive. He'd been surviving since day one, and he sure as fuck wasn't stopping now.

The issue with surviving is that you need something to survive. Drugs, abuse, gangs, karma, anything. It's an eternal game, probably the piss-poorest version of Russian roulette out there. 

Some people, they played the game in little ways. They wanted to die, but it shone through in tiny traits, nothing big or dangerous enough to attract any major attention. 2D didn't wear socks when he wore shoes, and it tended to fuck with his feet. He never fixed it, never bothered to put on a pair of socks. He didn't care to. 

Murdoc stopped hiding it a long time ago. He has a fucked up relationship with the game; He tends to bounce between wanting desperately to scream for help and wanting to drown himself in any avoidance method possible.

His memories of his most recent benders are pretty shattered, coming in and out. Sometimes, someone says something and the memory will come back, but other times, the memory won't. Noodle's hand brushed against his by accident the other day, and a fragment came back to him; His skin had felt like it was burning and he was floating, brain three feet above his head while her tiny palms caressed his forehead. She said something about him being feverish to someone, maybe 2D? It didn't matter. The memory ended right there. It was easier for him not to remember the benders, anyways. It was the only time he felt truly out of control.

It was like being a kid again--- like being his father's kid again.

Murdoc doesn't know who he would have been if he hadn't been his father's kid, and he doesn't want to know. It's for the best. He can stick with being a shitty person, with being damaged goods, just so long as he doesn't have to see what he could have been. 

It's for the best.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, a few notes:
> 
> -The cough syrup thing may not make a lot of sense to those who haven't dabbled in drugs or haven't been a junkie- DXM is found in most cough syrups, it's an easy way to get your hands on a dissasociative drug. If you drink a bottle (depending on the how much DXM is actually in it) you'all probably be tripping for anywhere from 6 hours-3 days.
> 
> -The idea for this came to me while my broke, addict ass what actually on a lot of DXM and I had a weird breakthrough in my thoughts about Murdoc. Previously, I hadn't particularly liked him; I found him to be a bit of an ass with plenty of unresolved trauma that helped fuel his asshole-ish, destructive behavior. This fic is my attempt to put my thoughts onto paper, and while it is very short, I definitely want to work on a longer analysis of Murdoc and his behavior in the future. 
> 
> -Please do not think I'm being pro-drug use in any of my notes or my stories. I added the line about Murdoc having to rely on Russel's goodwill to function as a small, personal reference- the day after one of my worst benders, a friend of mine propped me up and kept me functional. It was shit, I'm not going to lie. My memories of that day are scattered, but I do remember her telling me that I was a dumbass and a mess-- all this while I was slumped in the passenger seat, eating Mcdonalds fries and crying with sunglasses on because the sun was too much for me to handle. So yeah, like...actually don't do drugs.
> 
> -This was also meant to be an attempt to work out characterizations of the Gorillaz and for me, as an author, to try and understand how they interact and properly write it. It's important to note that I haven't read Rise of the Ogre (I plan to start reading it after work tomorrow) and this is basically me going in half-blinded.


End file.
